St. Jude is working to drive the overall survival rate for childhood cancer to more than 90 per cent.

In June 2017, Tammy’s parents, Tien and Alice, learned their son had a cancerous brain tumor called an anaplastic ependymoma. After Tammy underwent surgery to resect the tumor, his parents turned to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital® for Tammy’s treatment.

Treatments invented at St. Jude have helped push the overall childhood cancer survival rate from 20 per cent to more than 80 per cent since it opened more than 50 years ago. St. Jude is working to drive the overall survival rate for childhood cancer to more than 90 per cent, and we won’t stop until no child dies from cancer.

At St. Jude, Tammy’s treatment will include 33 rounds of proton therapy and four rounds of chemotherapy. Remarkably, at his young age, Tammy has gone through most of his proton radiation treatments without sedation. His St. Jude Child Life specialists saw this potential in him and worked with him to make it a reality. “At St. Jude, they take care of everything,” Tien said. “There’s a sense of community here.”

Tien describes Tammy as a brave, curious and inquisitive boy. Tammy loves going to the zoo, where he likes to visit the camels and monkeys. He also likes to do arts and crafts.